Crack Commando Unit
by shallowness
Summary: Alec introduced Mole to the Ateam. And the other trannies too. Max, Alec, Mole, Joshua friendship. MA implied.


Disclaimer: Don't own or profit from the characters or TV shows referenced below, only playing with them.

Notes: I LOVED the A-team (child of the eighties) and I LOVE these four together. Thus, this was bound to happen. Post the books, but no major spoilers. Gratitude goes as ever to FridayAngel for betaing, and all remaining idiocies are mine.

Crack Commando Unit: shallowness

There were many, many things for which Max blamed Alec, a list she updated daily in his hearing. Introducing Mole to television was one of them. At first, the gruff, opinionated desert soldier only had time for the news, like all of Terminal City's inhabitants, watching carefully for the messages within the bland newscasters' lies. But you could only take so many anti-transgenic reports and the lizard man had been as dismissive of Alec's compulsion to get his own TV set into the besieged territory as Joshua.

Only Max had supported Alec, even going so far as demanding if Dix could fix one up from the spare parts salvaged from all over. The monacled nomaly had looked up in disbelief from his beloved computer, and bitingly, for him, asked:

"When exactly am I going to do that?"

Luke must have told Alec about the incident because he was soon hounding Max about it, instead of reporting on the stock of armaments or morale.

"Is it because you want me to be happy, Max?" he demanded, giving her a wide-eyed look that he probably assumed meant he looked loveable or something.

"Nope," she ground out, "I want you to shut up and get out of my hair. Your boob tube seems to keep you amused, so sooner we get you one, less annoying you are. Not that you'll ever stop being totally annoying, of course."

"There are other ways of keeping me amused," he replied, discarding the innocent look.

"Well go and find them, lech," she snapped.

"Right now?" he asked too sweetly.

"Yeah, get out of my face."

"So you don't want to know we've got some more ammo? Or the exact details of the haul or anything?" he hadn't moved a jot. She scowled.

* * *

So he got his TV and tried to get the others to watch it with him. Responses varied, Joshua preferring to ignore it and bring his own entertainment in the form of an easel when he hung with Alec. Gem said it had detrimental effect on her daughter, Luke blinked at it. For all his legendary charm, Alec's only convert to the wasteland of attention deficit seemed to be Dalton.

Every now and then Max would join them, but it usually lead to her punching Alec because he could never resist commenting when an Eyes Only hack broke in. And his comments were never flattering. Trouble was they were sometimes also accurate. But there was no admission of that from Max, only a degeneration to some kind of cushion fight and then someone (usually Max) getting pinned down to the floor, stared at by Dalton and ignored by Joshua.

At least, she'd thought he was ignoring them, until the day he unveiled a certain picture.

"Fighting," he'd said "Max and Alec fighting."

"Oh," Max had replied, unable to offer any other response whatsoever. Alec's eyebrows had taken a while to return to their normal level too. Both held off from the cushion-fights for a while.

* * *

Then the day came that Alec realized he had to change tactics, and use all the information he'd already acquired about the delights of the small screen to influence his targets. He walked in on a meeting, intent on his goal, not even smiling at the female population he passed on his way. He headed straight for Mole, which was fine with Max, because she and Dix were discussing some new intel Logan had forwarded. Absolutely fine.

"Mole, bro, I know exactly what you and I are going to be doing at oh twenty hours tonight."

"Huh," snorted Mole through his cigar.

"Let me set the scene," Alec raised his arm. "Some beer, some peanuts. A black van with a red stripe. A crack commando unit, four soldiers of fortune, on the run, chased by an insane military commander." His other arm had come up too and he was now waving both hands. "Things go kablooey! They have gunfights every ten minutes! You are going to love it." He punctuated the last remark with a finger to Mole's chest. The fact that Alec had been able to do so was the final proof that the taller transhuman had just been railroaded, if you knew him well enough to look for the signs. Alec turned before there was a chance of recovery, but took a little detour on his exit towards Max.

"You can come too if you bring refreshments. Beer and peanuts, preferably."

Max told herself at seven fifty five that it was only because Joshua sounded so excited and it seemed open house. . .

At seven fifty seven she was informed with a smirk that there were plenty of snacks, but her empty-handed gesture was surely appreciated.

* * *

Now she was sitting, squirming in the mess hall, wishing that a certain TV show had lain in obscurity so it wasn't haunting every moment she spent with the three guys sharing her table. She had actually caught Joshua, kind, gentle Joshua telling Gem to "Shut up, you fool," yesterday.

Of course Gem and he had burst out laughing, but still, Max felt it was all wrong. Now, here they were again, side-tracking from what was meant to be a pre-planning meeting lunch. She couldn't even stomp away in disgust, because she'd barely started on her meal and due to the oh-so-sensitive noses of some of the City's inhabitants, hot meals stayed in the mess hall or the coffee shop.

It was, like everything, Alec's fault. It didn't help his likely life-span that he'd answered her question about tackling the Webber mission with a grinning "I've got a plan."

"Oh no, no, no," Mole had said. "Forget it, you are not Hannibal."

Alec smirked.

"And you are, Monster of the Black Lagoon?"

"Cigar!" Mole said succinctly. As Max started rolling her eyes at the testosterone-fuelled role-playing, Joshua joined in.

"Alec's Face anyway."

A little snicker escaped beneath the eye-rolling.

"He wishes."

"I could teach Templeton Peck a few things 'bout the ladies, but that's cool," Alec said, apparently ignoring his own little pep squad, to Mole and Joshua's surprise.

"But not about managing your little black book," she snorted.

"You see guys, the more pressing question is, who's Maxie? Pissed or crazy?"

"Pissed," Mole said, barely thinking about it.

The mature thing would have been to heap some more food on her fork and shove it in her mouth. That would have been the ladylike response, the one that rose above it. Only the Logan Cales of this world had held the delusion that Max Guevara was mature or ladylike.

"Are you saying I wear tacky gold jewelry and get panicky over flying like that pansy-ass beardie?" she sputtered.

"He's merely suggesting that you have an attitude problem." In response, she punched Alec in the arm, and he reacted with more amusement than shock, although his other hand came up instinctively to rub the part of his arm that had been hit. She gave him another vicious wallop. Smiling easily, he held both hands up defensively to ward off the spitfire at his side. It sort of worked as her fists stood down. Which was when he put a friendly arm around her and genially told the table. "Point proved."

He'd overlooked her leg, and though there wasn't enough space for her to hope to break a bone, she made do with stepping on his foot and grinding down.

"Alec think Joshua crazy?" a distraught voice made the combatants stare at him.

"No, no. You're – Murdock's the most important member of the team, Josh. Remember how they always have to get him out of- out to join them?"

"Like Little Fella did?" Doubtful eyes in the oddly leonine face turned upon her. Max tried smiling, although it was hard with Alec's arm still around her.

"Exactly," she smiled, "they depend upon him to see things that they can't and he's as good a fighter as any of them." Max felt the arm tighten around her the tiniest bit.

"Tacky gold jewelry not suit Joshua anyway."

Alec slid back his arm to continue eating. There was nothing for Max to do but nod to Joshua and continue heaping the food upon her fork.

"But B.A.'s cool, Little Fella."

"Hey, we're all as cool as the A-team," Alec said flippantly.

"What's the reporter's name?"

"She your type, Mole? I'd have thought her skin was too smooth. Amy."

"You have a better recall for a fictional character's name than most of your one night stands!" exclaimed Max.

His eyes narrowed.

"Why Mole ask?" Joshua demanded with haste and Alec went back to clearing his plate, relaxing his features into blankness.

"Logan's that Amy chick," Mole said nonchalantly, not at all as if he'd dropped a match in the bonfire that was Max's temper, just a short while after Alec had emptied a whole can of gasoline there. "The reporting thing-"

Knowing that these last drips of gas were strictly overkill. Alec couldn't help commenting:

"Nah, Logan doesn't have the legs to be Amy."

Whoosh.

END.

Feedback – always welcomed.


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